Study and analysis of factors for sustainability and excellance of r and d organizations

Abstract

newline Public-funded RandD organizations (PFROs) not only provide science and technology infrastructure in a nation but also act as a backbone for the growth of industry and national development. In today s highly dynamic environment, self-sustainability has become a mandatory survival strategy for public-funded RandD organizations. For an RandD organization to be self-sustainable, the RandD organization must be capable of generating resources on a continuous basis so that it is able to keep pace with the state of the art. This is why there is a need for looking at the different aspects of making an RandD organization self-sustainable in India. For which, following objectives were outlined for the present study: a) To identify the present self-sustainability levels of selected PFROs, through analysis of the financial resources secured from RandD operations performed by the selected laboratories of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), one of the largest PFROs of the world, and b) To identify and present various factors that are responsible for self-sustainability of PFROs. newline newlineThere are several approaches tried and tested as per literature for self-sustainability. One of the ways to identify self-sustainability levels of PFROs is to assess the outcome of research by way of earnings vis-a-vis expenditure per scientist. For long-term sustainability, earnings must be enough not only to meet day-to-day expenses but also capital expenditure for future growth. For meeting the objective (part-1) of the study, detailed annual reports (2011-2018) of six of the selected constituent laboratories of CSIR, were evaluated for data concerning external cash flow (ECF) resources generated by them. The data analysis gives an indication of the level of self-sustainability for different institutions of CSIR. newline newlineFrom the analysis of data, the results of six Labs under study indicated clearly that for the self-sustainability of a laboratory, the expenditure per scientist must be justified by the ECF per scientist.